Description of the Prior Art
An analog signal can be converted to and be represented by digital words consisting of a number of binary digits. Data processing systems generally incorporate an ADC for converting an analog signal to a binary or digital representation. Each value of input voltage generates a specific binary output of 1s and 0s. During the process of conversion, the ADC samples the analog signal periodically and generates a digital output that corresponds to the analog signal. The sampling frequency is much higher than the frequency of the analog signal and the sampling times are close enough whereby several samples are obtained for each cycle of the analog signal.
There are several ADC implementations, such as the counter type having up-down counting ability, the successive-approximation type for high speed conversion, and the dual-slope type that provides long-term accuracy, by way of example.